


Once I dreamed of dancing

by halfeatenmoon



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Prostitution, Revenge, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 10:44:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,670
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16721826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfeatenmoon/pseuds/halfeatenmoon
Summary: Once, Oola had dreamed of nothing but dancing. Dancing wasn't enough any more, though. Freedom wasn't enough. She wanted revenge.





	Once I dreamed of dancing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AceQueenKing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/gifts).



Oola regretted resisting Jabba that afternoon, and at the same time, she didn’t. She’d escaped the rancor’s clutches, but now she was confined to the slave dancers’ quarters for the rest of the night, while the other girls, her sisters in arms, would sleep warm in other men’s beds. Oola was free from Jabba’s clutches for tonight, but she was also alone in the rough, hard confines of their shared quarters, with nobody for company.  
  
So she danced.  
  
There was no music, but she didn’t need it any more. Had she wanted to, Oola could have tuned in to the faint strains of the band’s music from the rooms above, but that wasn’t the way she danced when she was alone. The music of her childhood was fading from her memory over the years, but she still remembered enough, the songs that had once made her whole heart sing, made her move like she couldn’t help herself.  
  
Dancing was the reason they kept her as a slave, now, and it was how she’d gotten into this mess. She loved to dance, and she wanted to do nothing else. As soon as she was old enough to leave her family, she’d traveled the galaxy, hitching rides with freighters and smugglers, just searching for somewhere she could make a living on her toes. And it had worked, for a few years. She wasn’t rich, but she was happy. Until she was on a ship that got raided, and despite her innocent intentions she found herself on the wrong side of a slaver’s whip.  
  
And so she danced for the slavers, and for the bidders at auction, and every one of her masters, hoping that if she had to be a slave then at least she could be enslaved doing the one thing she loved. Her dancing was usually muted, now, twisted by what Jabba and his guests demanded instead of what she wanted, but when she had moments like this she could dance the way she loved, her body gracefully twisting from one shape to another, rising and falling and flying with the joy of movement. Alone, she could dance as she pleased.  
  
Until a deep, rich voice interrupted her, saying “Beautiful. Can you teach me to do that?”  
  
She stumbled to a halt. At the door of the quarters was a small human woman with a guard at her shoulder. She was dressed in the heavy, dark clothing of a frequent spacer, and watching her with an unnerving confidence. Oola straightened up and tried to look her best.  
  
“Are you here to buy me, ma’am?”  
  
The guard laughed and pushed the woman forward. “That’s your majesty. You’re talking to Princess Leia of Alderaan. Or you were. From now on she’s one of you. Get her in some appropriate attire.” He smirked as he eyed them both up and down. “And see if you can teach her a thing or two about real dancing.”  
  
He slammed the door shut and stalked off, leaving them both alone in the room.  
  
“Well, I’m Oola.” She shrugged and gestured around the room. “Welcome to the slave dancers’ quarters. We wear whatever Jabba buys us and sleep wherever we feel like, as long as it’s the floor.”  
  
“Wow,” Leia said, looking around. “This is bleak.”  
  
Oola bristled. “Sorry the slave quarters aren’t up to your standards.”  
  
But Leia shook her head and lay a hand on Oola’s arm. “I’m sorry, that’s not what I meant. I’m sorry you have to live in these conditions. The Empire is one thing, but when we win this war, I want to make sure the government that replaces it doesn’t turn a blind eye to places like this ever again.”  
  
“And I look forward to you doing that, once you find your way out of here. But first we have to get you dressed.”  
  
Oola was perfunctory in fitting Leia with an appropriate dancer’s costume. The slaves’ shared wardrobe wasn’t large, but they had a range of sizes, even if the outfits had little variation. If Leia was uncomfortable with Oola seeing her dress, she didn’t show it, and for her part, Oola felt nothing. She had watched women dress and undress in this room every day for years, and there was nothing to excite her about it now. But Leia sighed when Oola clasped the bikini top at her back, and instead of pulling away she leaned back into Oola’s hands.  
  
“Leia?” she said, uncertainly.  
  
Leia coughed and stood upright. “Sorry. It’s been a while since I last touched someone, and it’s been a very long day.”  
  
“Oh. Yes, I… I can understand that. Although I should warn you that if Jabba’s chosen you for a dancer, there are going to be lots of people touching you.”  
  
Leia took a step away from her, a look of grim determination on her face. “They can try.”  
  
Oola felt her jaw clenching. She hated this part, when the new girls came in, and wanted to resist. When they thought they could keep away from the men’s hands and desires, and their beds. She just wanted to let them down gently, to prepare them for what was to come, but too often she just made them more determined to fight and more devastated when they found out they couldn’t.  
  
She put an arm around Leia’s shoulders, since she seemed to crave touch so much, and found she enjoyed the way Leia curled around her body. Soft, skin to skin, and warm from the Tatooine heat even when they were underground. “You can try, if you want. But Jabba doesn’t have much reason to tolerate laves who fight back. It’s obedience, or being fed to the Rancor. Your choice.”  
  
Leia’s fingers tightened around Oola’s waist. “I’m not going to be here that long.”  
  
“I wouldn’t try escaping. You’ll end up dead.”  
  
“A lot more people will be dead if I don’t try. And I have friends. I have a plan.”  
  
It was Oola’s fingers who tightened on Leia’s shoulder now, and after a moment, she pushed her away.  
  
“That’s nice for you,” Oola forced out. She remembered friends, and family, and thinking they would come to set her free once day. They never did. “I’m still putting money on you dying first.”  
  
“I’ve escaped death at Darth Vader’s hands. I can take Jabba.”  
  
“Great,” Oola snapped. She was tired of this, of this hopeful, naive person who wouldn’t even listen. Of the dreams that Oola didn’t dare dream for herself any more. “Great. Well, good luck to you, Leia. I guess it’s been nice meeting you.”  
  
“Oh, for… I’m taking you with me, tentacle brains.”  
  
Oola wasn’t going to laugh. She wasn’t. That wasn’t her mouth twitching. “What?”  
  
“Assuming you want to come, that is. My friends are coming, we’re going to break out of here and rejoin the Rebel Alliance, and you’re coming with me.”  
  
“You’re going to make me into a Rebel?”  
  
“I’m going to drop you off wherever you want to go. Anywhere that isn’t here. That is, if you want to come?”  
  
Oola’s mouth was suddenly dry. Too much hope, too fast. She didn’t trust hope. But Leia radiated a kind of conviction, a magnetism, that made her want to believe. “Will it be dangerous.”  
  
“Absolutely. But do you feel safe here?”  
  
Oola didn’t have to answer that. She took hold of Leia’s shoulders, holding her out at arm’s length, and studied her face as if looking for some sign that this was a trick.  
  
She meant to hug her. She didn’t mean for it to turn into a kiss. Leia was just so there, and Oola might be used to being surrounded by almost nude women but she so rarely had privacy about it, and she had too many feelings, and…  
  
And Leia clearly didn’t mind. She had a hand around Oola’s waist immediately, and the other at the back of her neck, cupping the base of her lekku. She kissed as fiercely as she did everything else, leaving Oola almost breathless. Leia, she could tell, was a woman who knew the value of frantic kisses in stolen moments.  
  
Oola didn’t want this to stop, she really didn’t. She’d enjoyed the kisses of the other dances before, but never with this much privacy, never with the passion of a fellow flave who had such fierce conviction that they were going to get out, and soon. But she had become alert to every guard’s footsteps, and she knew there was someone approaching.  
  
“They’re coming to get one of us. Probably you,” Oola said, breaking away and taking a step back. “Jabba will want to see his newest slave in action first.”  
  
“Not for long. My friends won’t be far behind. The fight starts soon.”  
  
Oola felt a lump in her throat. “What if I’m still confined to quarters?”  
  
“I won’t leave without you,” Leia said, squeezing her hand.  
  
Oola knew she needed to let Leia go, and trust she’d come through for her like she promised. But she couldn’t help asking, “What will I do when I’m not here?”  
  
“Anything you want. Anything in this whole galaxy, as long as you can avoid the Empire making you do something else. What do you dream of?”  
  
Oola used to dream of dancing. That was her life’s ambition, once, when she was a young spawn and thought she had the whole galaxy before her. There was nothing else she loved the way she loved dancing, and it was what had kept her going through these awful years of slavery.  
  
Now, though, dancing wasn’t enough. Dancing felt tainted. Moving her body felt good, but she had longer dancing as a slave than she had as a free citizen. She didn’t just want to dance free again. She wanted revenge.  
  
“I dream of taking these chains in my hands,” Oola said, slowly, “And strangling that bastard to death.”  
  
Leia chuckled, throaty and rich and joyful. “We can definitely make that dream come true.”


End file.
